sonicwfandomcom-20200216-history
Halloween H20: 20 Years Later
| story = Robert Zappia | based on = | starring = | music = John Ottman | cinematography = Daryn Okada | editing = Patrick Lussier | studio = * Trancas International }} | distributor = Dimension Films | released = | runtime = 86 minutes | country = United States | language = English | budget = $17 million''Halloween: H20'' at Box Office Mojo | gross = $55 million }} Halloween H20: 20 Years Later is a 1998 American slasher film directed by Steve Miner. It is the seventh installment in the ''Halloween'' film series. The screenplay by Robert Zappia and Matt Greenberg was from a story by Zappia. Jamie Lee Curtis reprises her role as Laurie Strode, with additional roles played by Adam Arkin, Michelle Williams, Adam Hann-Byrd, Jodi Lyn O'Keefe, Janet Leigh, Josh Hartnett, LL Cool J and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. The film was released on August 5, 1998, two and a half months before the 20th anniversary of John Carpenter's original Halloween (1978). Set twenty years after the events of the first two movies, H20 centers on a post-traumatic Laurie Strode living in fear of her brother Michael Myers, who attempted to kill her all those years ago. When Michael eventually appears, Laurie must face evil one last time, while the life of her teenage son hangs in the balance. The film is dedicated to Donald Pleasence who portrayed Samuel Loomis in the franchise. Pleasence died in 1995. A sequel, Halloween: Resurrection, was released in 2002, with Jamie Lee Curtis reprising her role as Laurie Strode. Plot On October 29, 1998, twenty years after the massacre in Haddonfield, Dr. Sam Loomis' former colleague Marion Chambers returns home to Langdon, Illinois, to find that her house had been burglarized. Her teenage neighbor Jimmy and his friend Tony call the police. Marion discovers that the file on Laurie Strode, Michael Myers' sister, is missing. She immediately rushes back over to Jimmy's house, where she finds him and Tony dead. Michael Myers suddenly appears and attacks Marion before slitting her throat, killing her. The police arrive just as Michael leaves the house with Laurie's file. Meanwhile, in California, Laurie is living a seemingly perfect life with her teen son John and her boyfriend Will, and has a career as the headmistress of Hillcrest Academy, a private boarding school where John attends. However, Laurie is far from happy, as the tragic events from 1978 still haunt her and lives in fear that her brother may return. Laurie has tried to get her life together with the hope that Michael would never come after her again. She ultimately faked her death in a car accident, and then relocated to California under an assumed name, Keri Tate. While a woman and her daughter are at a rest stop, the two narrowly avoid Michael, who steals the woman's car. At the academy campus, the students leave for an overnight field trip at the Yosemite National Park. Later that evening, John and his girlfriend Molly are having a Halloween party in the basement with their friends, Charlie and his girlfriend Sarah. Charlie goes off into the kitchen and is killed by Michael. Sarah finds Charlie's body and tries to escape via the dumbwaiter, but Michael savagely disfigures her leg before stabbing her to death. John and Molly go searching for their friends and are pursued by Michael through the school grounds. Laurie opens the door for them and finally comes face-to-face with Michael for the first time in two decades. When Will sees the school's security guard, Ronny, approaching, he mistakes him for Michael and shoots him. Michael then appears and stabs Will in the back, killing him. Laurie helps John and Molly escape before heading back to face Michael herself. She stabs Michael multiple times, knocking him off a balcony, but when she tries to stab him again, Ronny, who survived the shooting, subdues her, telling her that Michael is dead. The police and paramedics arrive and put Michael in a body bag, loading it into a coroner's van. Laurie, knowing that Michael is not really dead and is extremely difficult to kill, grabs the fire axe and an officer's gun and steals the van. When Michael awakens and escapes the body bag, Laurie slams on the brakes, throwing him through the windshield. She then hits him at full speed and the vehicle tumbles down a cliff with her falling out and pinning Michael between the van and a tree. Laurie recovers the axe and decapitates Michael, finally killing him. Police sirens are heard off in the distance as Laurie exhales. Cast * Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode / Keri Tate * Chris Durand as Michael Myers * Michelle Williams as Molly Cartwell * Josh Hartnett as John Tate * Jodi Lyn O'Keefe as Sarah Wainthrope * Adam Arkin as Will Brennan * LL Cool J as Ronald "Ronny" Jones * Adam Hann-Byrd as Charlie Deveraux * Janet Leigh as Norma Watson * Nancy Stephens as Marion Chambers * Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Jimmy Howell * Lisa Gay Hamilton as Shirley "Shirl" Jones * Tom Kane as Dr. Sam Loomis (voice only) Production The screenplay was based on a story by Kevin Williamson, and the story was situated as a sequel to the previous six movies, thereby keeping the timeline's continuity. However, the screen play was developed by Robert Zapia and Matt Greenberg to function as an alternate timeline, in which the previous three installments never happened and Laurie's daughter Jamie Lloyd, never existed. John Carpenter was originally in the running to be the director for this particular follow-up since Curtis wanted to reunite the cast and for the crew of the original to have active involvement in it. It was believed that Carpenter opted out because he wanted no active part in the sequel; however, this is not the case. Carpenter agreed to direct the film, but his starting fee as director was $10 million. Carpenter rationalized this by believing the hefty fee was compensation for revenue he never received from the original Halloween, a matter that was still a point of contention between Carpenter and Akkad even after twenty years had passed. When Akkad balked at Carpenter's fee, Carpenter left the project, though supposedly served as an uncredited producer. Scream writer/producer Kevin Williamson was involved in various areas of production. Although not directly credited, he provided rewrites in character dialogue and helped make alterations and sketches of the script. He also came up with the paramedic storyline that explained how Michael survived the ending, which was partially filmed the day after principal photography ended and later utilized in the film’s sequel. The original working title for the film was Halloween 7: The Revenge of Laurie Strode. Music The original music score was composed by John Ottman, but some music from Scream was added to the chase scenes later on during post-production. Ottman expressed some displeasure about this action in an interview featured on the Halloween: 25 Years of Terror DVD released in 2006. Ottman's score was supplemented with Marco Beltrami's scores from Scream, Scream 2, and Mimic by a team of music editors as well as new cues written by Beltrami during the final days of sound mixing on the film. Dimension Films chief Bob Weinstein demanded the musical changes after being dissatisfied with Ottman's score.Halloween: H20 score at Filmtracks The song "What's This Life For" by the music group Creed was featured in the film during a party sequence and is also heard during the credits of the film. No official soundtrack was ever released for the film, but a compilation album by John Ottman was released in the United States and Germany under the Varese Sarabande label and includes the original score by Ottman and numerous other cuts. Alternate television version In February 2003, the FX network premiered an alternate version of the film, adding and extending footage not seen in the original release. It has yet to be released anywhere else, and the deleted scenes can be found on YouTube.Movie-censorship.com Reception Box office In terms of total gross, Halloween H20 is the highest-grossing film in the ''Halloween'' franchise. It was released on August 5, 1998 in the US and later in many other countries. H20 cost $17 million to produce and returned $55,041,738 in domestic box office sales with an opening weekend of $16,187,724, and $24,753,129 since its Wednesday debut. As for video/DVD rentals, the film grossed over $21 million. Critical reception Halloween H20 received an approval rating of 51% on the internet review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes based on 57 reviews; the site's general consensus is "Halloween: H20 is the best of the many sequels, yet still pales in comparison to the original Halloween." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B-" on an A+ to F scale. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times awarded the film two out of four stars, while Lawrence Van Gelder of The New York Times wrote that "the throwaway jokes are few and far between, and after a pre-title sequence reintroduces Michael and shows just how far up suspense and thrills can be ratcheted, Halloween H20 declines into the routine," adding: "Nobody is going to be surprised by who lives and who dies." Bob Graham of the San Francisco Chronicle praised the film's referentiality, as well as Curtis's performance, writing: "Slasher films often seem merely a joke, and with good reason, but in this case that's too bad. Curtis, with her plain, unglamorous appearance, rises to the occasion and delivers as compelling a performance as any this summer." Writing for the Austin Chronicle, Marc Savlov said of the film: "Miner strives to imbue the film with the requisite autumnal haze of the original but then gives up midway through and instead resorts to the standard stalk 'n' slash formulas. It's heartening to see a beloved character revived like this (at one point during the screening I attended, audience members actually stood up and cheered), but H20—for all its good, gory intentions—is barely a shadow of the original." Home media In the United States, Halloween H20 was released on VHS and laserdisc by Buena Vista Home Video. In the United Kingdom, the film was released on VHS in 1998, a re-release was made on September 1, 2000. On DVD, the film was first released by Dimension Films on October 19, 1999 as part of the "Dimension Collector's Series" on DVD. It was released in the UK on October 22, 2001 and re-released on April 25, 2011. It was also released exclusively in the UK in 2004, as part of the complete collection, consisting of the first eight films, a set that is now out of print. It was re-released in the US by Echo Bridge Home Entertainment on April 26, 2011, although, it does not contain its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, it now features a new 1.66:1 widescreen transfer. Echo Bridge later re-released the film in a triple feature set with Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers and Halloween: Resurrection.Amazon.com Halloween H20 was released in Canada for the first time ever on Blu-ray by Alliance released along with Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers and Halloween: Resurrection on January 12, 2010. On May 3, 2011 it was released by Echo Bridge Home Entertainment in the US but with an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 (not cropped from the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, but rather open-matte due to the film being shot in Super 35). It was also released along with Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers in one Blu-ray collection. It was again released on September 23, 2014 (in its original theatrical 2.35:1 aspect ratio) in the "Halloween: The Complete Collection Blu-ray Box Set" featuring a new commentary with Jamie Lee Curtis and Steve Miner and extra features including behind the scenes footage and archival interviews not seen on any other release. External links * * * * Category:1998 films Category:1998 horror films Category:1990s horror thriller films Category:American slasher films Category:1990s sequel films Category:1990s serial killer films Category:Alternative sequel films Category:American films Category:American horror thriller films Category:American sequel films Category:American serial killer films Category:English-language films 7 Category:Films about educators Category:Fratricide in fiction Category:Dimension Films films Category:Film scores by John Ottman Category:Films directed by Steve Miner Category:Films set in 1998 Category:Films set in California Category:Film scores by Marco Beltrami